SYNOPSIS

Simone, Emory and Adela are outcasted, young moms living in the Florida panhandle and figuring motherhood, life, and love out.

RECAP AND REVIEW

Thank you NetGalley, Knopf, and the author for ARC in exchange for an honest review.

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This is a literary, coming-of-age book told from the first person from Simone, Emory, and Adela’s perspectives.

I loved the three of them and seeing their journey across the three trimesters. I loved seeing their sisterhood, and the community Simone built for other young mothers, despite the judgement she endured for having her twins at sixteen, and the cautionary tale she became for those in her town.

I loved how they had moments of contention along with moments of connection. Because when it came to being a mother, forced out the house, alone in some situations, or struggling to connect with their kids or anyone, only the other Girls could understand and were willing to help.

The writing of this book hooked me from the first page. It was poetic and raw and early on I knew this book was going to be one of my favorites of the year.

This book takes serious topics- poverty, abortion, motherhood, abandonment, age-gap, adult/child relationships, the double standard of being the one pregnant vs. the one getting someone pregnant and more – and packages them in a way that can cause conversation without speaking on it directly. The topics are not theories being discussed, but shown apart of these girls everyday lives.

This author does a great job of showing, instead of telling, and allowing readers to form conclusions about what they’re reading, though it’s clear how messed up some of the situations were.

Read for:

🍼 Teen moms

🍼 Sisterhood

🍼 Coming-of-age

🍼 3 POVs

🍼 Different, but alike characters

🍼 Real and raw depictions

OVERALL

Overall, I give this a 5 out of 5 stars. This book will be on my mind for a long time. Though the mothers here are young, I think there’s great depictions of motherhood in general alongside the intersectionality of it. Each girl had their own journey and I was invested in it all.